Yeah, the lore's pretty easy to ignore. Other than a few things involving Greek gods there wasn't really much that actually impacted or limited character creation.

Oh, I suppose that the Peacebringer and Warshade stuff was a bit lore heavy but in my experience people either went all in on it or ignored it completely. Oh and the Arachnos archetypes. But same as PB and WS there... Well I guess not so cut and dry there. Some were rogue agents and such.

But the lore was pretty easy to ignore. I mean how else do you explain having ran the FrostFire mission 4 times in one day?

Again it's choosing a descriptor for the character. It's easy to ignore or not make use of something you have no control over, but less so for something that you do.

I mean you could just make a character and hit the random button then put in your bio what your character -actually- looks like... but most wouldn't do this because you have control over it. And you have control over the missions you chose and did. I never knew the origin missions existed but if I did I'd probably just do them and like most missions I did they would have no impact on my RP. I didn't RP levels as power either, because in CoH it was a security level, it was what your clearance was. But in game level = power.

I guess in short most of the gameplay and lore had no effect on my RP because it wasn't really something I could control. But my origin was a choice I had to make, that defined my character in some way. Though also for me I chose whatever seemed to fit best and didn't usually have much trouble with it... But I can clearly see how some people would.

Origins in City of Heroes basically did 3 things (by the end).

Gave you a specific "Origin Power" that was almost completely worthless beyond Level 8, and was really something that was just "filler" while in Outbreak/Breakout/District 7. Two of those "Origin Powers" did energy damage and could therefore ignite Oil Slicks, so for Trick Arrow builds, your choice of Origin Power might make a difference as to whether or not you could ignite an Oil Slick yourself or not.

The Level 1-5 stories in Atlas Park and Galaxy City that you began playing were determined by your Origin. You were assigned to a specific Origin group (DATA for Technology, ELITE for Natural, MAGI for Magic, GIFT for Mutant, SERAPH for Science) Contact to do your first set of missions in the city at large, which in turn determined what type of opponents you would be fighting in those starter stories (Naturals fought a lot of 5th Column/Council to start out, for example). The problem with this was that these Origin supporting groups got left behind and forgotten by the game lore/stories that you were doing almost immediately ... except for [url=yWCq9KiY9Yo]the infamous Azuria of MAGI[/url] ... who was simply too incompetent on a wildly consistent basis to be believed.

Determined which "flavor" of Dual Origin and Single Origin Enhancements you could use. Training Origin Enhancements were Origin agnostic, while Dual Origins contained 2 of the 5 Origins, and Single Origins were (of course) 1 of the 5 Origins. The net result of this was an incredible "bloat" of drop objects where MOST of what would drop for your character wound up being "wrong" for your character, and thus was functionally Vendor Bait. Later on, your Origin determined which "shops" you needed/wanted to go to in order to buy the Enhancements needed to slot into your Powers based on your Origin. Interestingly enough, the Level 35 Origin "shop NPCs" were ones that you needed to do a mission for in order to unlock their shop inventory, and there was one for each Origin. By the time you got to Level 40 though, Paragon Studios threw in the towel and stuffed ALL of the Origin Enhancements into a SINGLE shop NPC in Peregrine Island (Ghost Falcon), that you also needed to unlock to access his wares. Then Inventions came along in Issue 9 and made ALL OF THIS completely obsolete, since Inventions were Origin agnostic, just like Training Origin Enhancements, and Inventions didn't "degrade" as you Leveled Up, forcing you to replace EVERY Enhancement slotted into your Powers every 5 Levels.

And that was basically it.
Origins created a "hoop" to jump through that City of Heroes moved away from having any real meaningful use for.

Mind you, this isn't the first time I've seen something like this happen in a game. Arguably, Tabula Rasa did something even WORSE with its character creation system. You chose 1 of 2 character classes (which then branched off into all of the others), which was fine. You then got to play with a HUGE number of sliders and settings to make your character appear JUST SO in the avatar builder. Colors for the costume were assigned by COLOR WHEEL (!), meaning essentially full 256x256x256 color valuations, for all intents and purposes, and done in such a way as to make it very nearly impossible to consistently replicate choices across multiple characters/costume pieces. So getting the LOOK of your character before even playing the game was this really involved process with a tremendous plethora of options to choose from. You could easily spend about as much time picking the "look" for your character as you'd spend messing with options at ICON in City of Heroes.

And then ... as soon as gear started dropping in game ... pretty much every single one of those long and arduous choices got overwritten as the waste of time that they were. NONE of your starting gear "look" that you set up during character creation survived past Level 3-4, by which time you'd replaced ALL of your gear, which in turn dictated your appearance in game. And to top it all off, the game had helmets, nearly all of which were closed face, so all that work you did to make your character look JUST SO was completely wasted by the fact that you were probably never going to see your character's face ever again (unless if you used the Hide Helmet option that was later added to the game after launch).

It was such an incredible waste of time and effort that it was basically laughable to look at the character creator, which was more elaborate than the one that City of Heroes used, and realize that hardly anything you did in there "meant a tinker's damn" to what your character would ultimately wind up looking like once you got the armor used by your specialization (of which there were basically 4+2 types) that your character would "max out" their skill for and use nothing else ever again the entire time you were playing the game.

That's one thing I loved about CoH. Your "gear" didn't actually affect appearance. So many games these days are all about the epic loots and grinding for the best looking stuff in the game! Nice to have a change of pace.

You could say the issue with CoH's origin stuff being ignored was that it just wasn't that good. It wasn't interesting enough to catch people's attention and get them to actually want to do it. Maybe that was on purpose since origin really isn't that important. That said, I think a lot of cool or fun stuff below 50 felt more and more ignored. There were quite a few questlines that people skipped over or didn't even know existed. Like Frostfire and the Faultline/Fusionette missions. Just because people don't do them as much doesn't mean those questlines should be removed or changed.

If you don't like or care about picking an origin, then as BrandX said, you can just do what you did in CoH. Select one and not pay anymore attention to it. But I knew a few players who liked to roleplay their characters working alongside MAGUS and DATA because that was their characters origin. They started out being "sponsored" or guided by those groups. Even I had a story where I used SERAPH because my character had a science based origin and connections from in-game contacts. As long as it's completely optional and just adds flavor that some people might like to use, I don't see any reason to not include it. And of course CoT could do something with it to make it a little more interesting as well. Make the story stuff actually fun to do at lower levels. Like how Frostfire used to be THE mission to run before level 10 until everyone just did the sewers.

Lothic wrote:

It's key that you included the phrase "by the end" because that's really what happened to the concept of Origins in CoH - they evolved from something the Devs thought were going to be important in 2004 to something they did their best to effectively remove from the game by 2012.

Even when the game was released in 2004, Origins were a shadow of what they were envisioned to be during development. Back when power selection was freeform, your origin was the limiting factor - it determined what powers you could get, how many powers you got, and how ultimately potent these powers could be (very Marvel FASERIP I thought at the time). Obviously this was all ripped out, the archetype system was created, the powers were divvied up into distinct power sets, and origin became a vestigial remnant that the devs probably couldn't completely remove by the time the game went gold.

And like yourself and Redlynne said, the devs didn't shy away from further reducing their relevance as the game aged. If I recall correctly, even the starting origin-determined story arcs were ditched when they revamped the tutorial.

Edit: Oh and in regard to the original post - I agree with many others here that the concept of "race selection" in this game doesn't really make sense as it is currently structured, and that you could probably simulate this via your power selections.

notears wrote:

Lothic wrote:
notears wrote:
I think something like this would be better represented by tertiaries, where you get this race tertiaries that give you some resistances and people have different dialogues if you're different races.
The whole point of tertiaries is to give players the chance to better "diversify/customize" their characters. I suppose the Devs could go so far as to create specific tertiary sets that are meant to be taken as a means to define a specific "race/origin" for your character. I would still keep something like this fairly limited and I probably wouldn't even use words like "race" or "origin" to describe these kinds of tertiaries.
But as an example maybe one tertiary could be called "Underworld Affinity". It might have a few powers that are loosely "necromantic" in nature and maybe provide some kind of resurrection capability. Then people could point to having Underworld Affinity and say their character is some kind of Vampire or Zombie Lord or any number of generically related things. Another idea is "Cybernetic Affinity" that could provide powers that could be thematically related to robots or cyborg type characters. As long as you kept things like this relatively generic it could be "stretched" to fit many different character concepts.
Again I would stress that there would need to be many different versions of these kinds of "Affinity sets". If the Devs only provided like 6 or 8 of them then it would once again make people think there were only a few "legitimate" concepts to be pigeonholed into. Ideally there should be at least several dozen of these to select from and obviously that's not going to happen in time for the game's launch. This instead would make for a cool add-on update sometime after launch.
How would that work with Aethetic Decoupling though? Maybe we should just drop the whole "Races/origins" thing...

Bingo!... Devil's Advocacy for the win. :)

notears wrote:

How would that work with Aethetic Decoupling though? Maybe we should just drop the whole "Races/origins" thing...

When there were aesthetic themes that could be applied, it would have been possible and I even put forth a proposal on how it could be done. But it was revealed in the past month or so that aesthetic themes are no more and instead each ability will be able to have its own aesthetic. So one of your powers could be a punch, another one could be a spirit and another could be ice. I no longer see a way to associate aesthetics with mechanics strengths and weaknesses.

Having said that, however, there is nothing tying aesthetics to your character concept, either. In other words, if you design an alien [b]Executor[/b] with [i]Psychic Control[/i] and [i]Psychic Blast[/i] power sets, you could still make his attacks look like fire. So if aesthetics don't have to be tied to the power sets, why should we limit ourselves into saying that aesthetics need to be tied to origins either? It would be up to the player to determine their own origins and aesthetics and powers and put them together into something they like and want to play.

Aesthetic Decoupling still exists. The original design was to have applicable aesthetics being limited to the theme of the power set. The common example given (from the KS update) was Burning Blast could have visual particle fx that fit within the Burbubf theme; things that burn sich as fire, radiation, stinging sand...

Due to the issues with estabalishing and maintaining a database and keeping a pipeline for production that won’t drive everyone insane, aesthetics is no longer limited to theme. You can apply any visual aesthetic to any set. Super Strength can look like boxing moves with miniman fx, or weilding an axe with fire fx.

Tannim222 wrote:

Aesthetic Decoupling still exists. The original design was to have applicable aesthetics being limited to the theme of the power set. The common example given (from the KS update) was Burning Blast could have visual particle fx that fit within the Burbubf theme; things that burn sich as fire, radiation, stinging sand...
Due to the issues with estabalishing and maintaining a database and keeping a pipeline for production that won’t drive everyone insane, aesthetics is no longer limited to theme. You can apply any visual aesthetic to any set. Super Strength can look like boxing moves with miniman fx, or weilding an axe with fire fx.

Also can you colour code the numbers so we still know what damage is being dealt to us? Like maybe grey for physical, purple for exotic and yellow for energy? That way people won't be able to hide what type of damage they're doing behind the animations.

*!woem*

Doctor Tyche wrote:

notears wrote:

Also can you colour code the numbers so we still know what damage is being dealt to us? Like maybe grey for physical, purple for exotic and yellow for energy? That way people won't be able to hide what type of damage they're doing behind the animations.

We've been using a symbol along with colors to show this. So, you get hit with physical, you get a little red fist symbol next to a red number telling you the damage. Get hit with Energy, you get a yellow electrical spark symbol next to the red number. Etc.

Excellent question, notears. Excellent answer, MWM. So that should work with colorblindness, too.

Tannim222 wrote:

Aesthetic Decoupling still exists. The original design was to have applicable aesthetics being limited to the theme of the power set. The common example given (from the KS update) was Burning Blast could have visual particle fx that fit within the Burbubf theme; things that burn sich as fire, radiation, stinging sand...
Due to the issues with estabalishing and maintaining a database and keeping a pipeline for production that won’t drive everyone insane, aesthetics is no longer limited to theme. You can apply any visual aesthetic to any set. Super Strength can look like boxing moves with miniman fx, or weilding an axe with fire fx.

If there's no theme, I hope we can at least get an effect called Burbubf now. :-)

Cinnder wrote:

Tannim222 wrote:
Aesthetic Decoupling still exists. The original design was to have applicable aesthetics being limited to the theme of the power set. The common example given (from the KS update) was Burning Blast could have visual particle fx that fit within the Burbubf theme; things that burn sich as fire, radiation, stinging sand...
Due to the issues with estabalishing and maintaining a database and keeping a pipeline for production that won’t drive everyone insane, aesthetics is no longer limited to theme. You can apply any visual aesthetic to any set. Super Strength can look like boxing moves with miniman fx, or weilding an axe with fire fx.
If there's no theme, I hope we can at least get an effect called Burbubf now. :-)

Need to have an enemy NPC say that as they go down "Now I'll use Burbubf..."

notears wrote:

blacke4dawn wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:
Aesthetic Decoupling still exists. The original design was to have applicable aesthetics being limited to the theme of the power set. The common example given (from the KS update) was Burning Blast could have visual particle fx that fit within the Burbubf theme; things that burn sich as fire, radiation, stinging sand...
Due to the issues with estabalishing and maintaining a database and keeping a pipeline for production that won’t drive everyone insane, aesthetics is no longer limited to theme. You can apply any visual aesthetic to any set. Super Strength can look like boxing moves with miniman fx, or weilding an axe with fire fx.
So... we'll be able to choose fencing moves for Massive Melee, once those animation are in the game? If so, it feels wrong to me.
I understand why you chose to go this way, but it still kinda feels wrong.
It could work if your fencing style consists of careful attacks mixed with sudden quick ones to surprise your target. It is a reasonable way to go into a duel. Massive Melee is based around aoe effects and slow animations that get shorter the more you attack, it isn't just about large weapons, it could also mean that you have a more calculating fighting style rather than one that's just quick.

Well, fencing doesn't really feel like it'll lend itself well towards AoE. Maybe I'm just stuck in the more traditional/stereotypical depiction of fencing.

In my head I just can't get the image out that the base will look like slo-mo and the fully sped up ones will be "normal", or if base is "normal" then the sped up will look like high speed. I guess it's just one of those things where I have to see the results to believe it.

blacke4dawn wrote:

notears wrote:
blacke4dawn wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:
Aesthetic Decoupling still exists. The original design was to have applicable aesthetics being limited to the theme of the power set. The common example given (from the KS update) was Burning Blast could have visual particle fx that fit within the Burbubf theme; things that burn sich as fire, radiation, stinging sand...
Due to the issues with estabalishing and maintaining a database and keeping a pipeline for production that won’t drive everyone insane, aesthetics is no longer limited to theme. You can apply any visual aesthetic to any set. Super Strength can look like boxing moves with miniman fx, or weilding an axe with fire fx.
So... we'll be able to choose fencing moves for Massive Melee, once those animation are in the game? If so, it feels wrong to me.
I understand why you chose to go this way, but it still kinda feels wrong.
It could work if your fencing style consists of careful attacks mixed with sudden quick ones to surprise your target. It is a reasonable way to go into a duel. Massive Melee is based around aoe effects and slow animations that get shorter the more you attack, it isn't just about large weapons, it could also mean that you have a more calculating fighting style rather than one that's just quick.
Well, fencing doesn't really feel like it'll lend itself well towards AoE. Maybe I'm just stuck in the more traditional/stereotypical depiction of fencing.
In my head I just can't get the image out that the base will look like slo-mo and the fully sped up ones will be "normal", or if base is "normal" then the sped up will look like high speed. I guess it's just one of those things where I have to see the results to believe it.

Well there are different ways of fencing, and while you may be stuck on one particular type of fencing, one based around being quick and single target, another may think of fencing this way. Think of for example your entering a duel with this guy, and you use your quick and rapid style and this guy starts off slow and you feel like you're winning because he's on the defensive and your not. Then all of a sudden after he parries one of your blade strikes he goes on the aggressive and you're just not expecting it. That's what massive melee with a rapier is like.

About the races. Will CoT have some kheldians or something like that ?
I remember the feeling to turn into a giant monster or a tiny shrimp ^^

Huckleberry wrote:

blacke4dawn wrote:

notears wrote:

blacke4dawn wrote:

So... we'll be able to choose fencing moves for Massive Melee, once those animation are in the game? If so, it feels wrong to me.
I understand why you chose to go this way, but it still kinda feels wrong.

It could work if your fencing style consists of careful attacks mixed with sudden quick ones to surprise your target. It is a reasonable way to go into a duel. Massive Melee is based around aoe effects and slow animations that get shorter the more you attack, it isn't just about large weapons, it could also mean that you have a more calculating fighting style rather than one that's just quick.

Well, fencing doesn't really feel like it'll lend itself well towards AoE. Maybe I'm just stuck in the more traditional/stereotypical depiction of fencing.
In my head I just can't get the image out that the base will look like slo-mo and the fully sped up ones will be "normal", or if base is "normal" then the sped up will look like high speed. I guess it's just one of those things where I have to see the results to believe it.

Here's a little video someone put together showing how one creative team imagined a rapier being able to do AoE type damage. Awesome soundtrack by Jeff Williams is a bonus.

RWBY is awesome

Huckleberry wrote:

Project_Hero wrote:
Maybe they can just make a shape shifting powerset with a variety of different options for what your form looks like.
I really like this idea.
And I think they could do it kind of like how they did Commanders. By this, I mean that commanders will have four different focused play styles depending upon how many pets you get. So, for a shapeshifter archetype, I think they could do it based upon how many different shapes you can shift into. So a werewolf character with two shapes could be an option (one werebeast and one normal). And on the other end of the spectrum, you could have a completely morphing character who assumes nearly a different shape for each attack. I think the first cut at it might be a different shape for each type of attack, so you would get a melee single-attack shape and a melee AoE attack shape, a ranged attack shape, a control shape, a utility shape and the overall powerset options you get would be a combination of those, depending on how many shapes and of what type.
That could really be fun to play.

That... really has some potential.

Though I would not like to be the devs and having the [i]wonderful[/i] task of finding the balancing point for this kind of AT.

Indeed Tannim. It would then be trivial to add costume shifts to such stance changes.

But that is future development.

Huckleberry wrote:

Tannim222 wrote:
Shapeshifting would be an aesthetic, not a mechsnic.
To use Kheldian Peacenringers as an example:
The mechanic is having a diversified priamry of melee and ranged attacks with some support utility powers and a method of switching to a melee, ranged, or all-round style of play.
Now you could take a shape shifting aesthetic and apply it to each stance mode.
It wouldn't have to be an aesthetic only. Consider a two-shape design. You could almost treat your second shape as if it were a pet, in that you could design the power set to have certain buffs in one shaped form or the other. And the shaped form could be momentum-based (like Hulk) such that as long as you have momentum, you can keep the shape. Or it could be a toggle shape. Or different sets do it different ways. Thus it could be very mechanic-dependent, and not just aesthetic.
I could see a shapeshifting power set that includes these mechanics being worked into existing archetypes as a sixth option.
This could also very well be a completely new archetype, just like Commander is its own archetype. Whether MWM wants to make it so, or just make it aesthetic only, is the question.

Indeed, we discussed Momentum based shifting a couple if years ago internally. The shape shifting aspect is still annaesthetic. The momentum is the mechanic. What that looks like, even if it is anshape shifted form is all aesthetic.

Any moves we can get copied from RWBY is a win!